


Don't Do That

by roguetimebot



Category: The Banner Saga (Video Games)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, First Kiss, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, Missing Scene, The Banner Saga 3
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-30
Updated: 2020-03-30
Packaged: 2021-02-28 19:33:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,796
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23392549
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/roguetimebot/pseuds/roguetimebot
Summary: As the darkness looms closer, Alette feels burdened by the weight of her responsibilities. Ludin is determined to ease her worries.
Relationships: Ludin/Alette
Comments: 3
Kudos: 16





	Don't Do That

**Author's Note:**

> Set in Banner Saga 3 with Alette as the protagonist, waiting in Arberrang and hoping for the best.
> 
> I saw there were no fics for them and set out to remedy that.

Alette leaves the dungeon where Rugga is being kept, keeping a white knuckled grip on her bow. Anyone who crosses her at this moment may very well end up with an arrow in their throat.

The moment of vindictiveness only lasts for a moment. Her grip on her bow slackens and her exhaustion washes over her. She weaves through the crowded city, and at every turn, someone calls out to her.

“Alette!” a voice shouts. A voice she doesn’t recognize. She used to recognize everyone in her caravan. “Alette, please, just kill the dredge. I want to go home!”

At one point, she entertained the idea of shooting down every fallible comment against her. This faceless boy in the crowd simply didn’t understand the situation. She can’t just kill all the dredge. She can’t just traipse them back to Skogr. She is these people’s hero until anything goes wrong.

And it is hard not to feel like everything is going wrong.

“My wife is dead!” an older voice shouts from one of the houses she passes. “You could’ve stopped it!”

He could be referring to any number of incidents. The caravan tumbling down a water, or crossing the floating rock bridge that Eyvind had suspended, or simply not having enough food. She’s done what she can with what she has. Sometimes, when she stops to explain, people understand.

But Alette is sick of proving herself, of explaining herself at every turn, of everyone thinking they can do better. Even Oddleif, as much as Alette loves her, had been asserting her will over her recently. Iver, who she cares deeply for, even still, left without asking how she felt about the matter. Hakon, although he remains level-headed at some points, still bristles when varl interests are not at the forefront. And Rugga, of course, has fought Alette at nearly every turn. Everyone seems to act like they know better than Alette.

Everyone, perhaps, except Ludin.

Ludin’s father had passed, making him the rightful ruler of Arberrang. She could be in the midst of heated deliberations right now and he could impede her at every turn.

But Ludin had forfeited his rights to rule during the impending disaster to her judgment. He’d trusted her when it seemed like it was the last thing anyone wanted to do.

Alette never asked for this role, but suddenly felt a surge of warmth that for once, someone had let her know that they were willingly giving it to her.

And not begrudgingly. Ludin had expressed that she’d make, in his words, a "fantastic queen."

But it’s hard to let the warmth of those words affect her when the crowds still yells at her that she’s failing. As she’s recognized ambling down the street, the questions and demands are thrown at her from every side. 

She cuts into an alley behind some houses, hoping for a respite from everyone’s expectations.

Even in the alley, starving refugees huddled together gaze up at her.

“Alette?” one of the women asks. “Why isn’t there anymore food?”

She backpedals out of the alley and darts away. She doesn’t know where she’s going. Just…silence would be nice. She tries not to slam into people as she flees scrutiny, but it’s difficult with so many packed in together.

She doesn’t find solitude exactly, but she does find a field scattered with horseborn. They humans and varl are still skeptical of them, so they give the herd a wide berth. At least among the horseborn, they don’t speak her language and can keep their criticisms amongst each other. Alette weaves among them and find a rock jutting out of the grass smooth enough to sit on. She sets her bow at her feet and folds her head into her hands.

She wishes this day would just end already.

But none of them ever do.

She tenses when she hears human footfalls approaching her.

“Long day?” someone asks.

She relaxes a fraction as she recognizes the voice. She looks up into Ludin’s face, cast into soft shadows by the ever-present sun behind him.

“They’re all long days, aren’t they?” she points out.

“I suppose your right,” he accepts. He glances out toward the approaching darkness. “Though I find it hard to complain about that now.”

“You’re one of the few finding it hard to complain, I think,” Alette laughs humorlessly.

Ludin gazes down at her sympathetically. “Mind if I join you?”

Alette moves over on the rock, making room for the former prince of men. Ludin stabs his spear in the ground and sits beside her, drawing his knees to his chest.

“Did I add to your burdens?” he asks her. “When I left chose to leave these people’s fate in your hands, I didn’t mean it to distress you.”

“No, don’t apologize,” Alette dismisses. “It’s nice to have one person who thinks I have these people’s best interests at heart.”

“It’s not just me,” Ludin says. “They respect you.”

“I don’t if this is what respect feels like,” she muses.

“That’s how you know it’s respect,” he tells her. “When no one respected me, they at least showed me cordiality to my face.”

“I heard Hakon punched you in the face,” she recalled.

“Well, I suppose varl respect works a little differently.”

They both chuckle to themselves. It is perhaps the first time Alette has laughed since…she can’t even remember when. Her smiles falters as the thought occurs to her.

Ludin notices her hesitation to allow any joy into the moment.

“Do you ever think about what you’ll do next?” he asks.

“Next?” she frowns.

“After everything turns out okay and we were fools to worry in the first place,” he explains. He doesn’t for a moment think that it’s that easy, and it may very well be impossible, but he almost wishes Alette would entertain the idea.

Alette laughs bitterly at the thought.

“No, I can’t say I’ve thought about such a thing,” she dismisses.

“Well, go on, then,” Ludin urges.

“Huh?”

“Think about it,” he presses. “What do you want to do when all this is over and we can lay down our weapons?”

Alette scoffs. “Ludin, this is silly.”

“Be silly, then,” he pushes. “I’ll go first. I would want to take a nap.”

Alette laughs, and it doesn’t drop off so abruptly this time.

“Okay, I’ll bite,” she allows. “I think I’d like to start a family, if it were finally safe to.”

“Really?” he quirked an eyebrow. That hadn’t been the answer he’d expected. 

“With my mom and…and dad gone,” she begins with some effort, “it means I’m the last of us. And I still haven’t gotten used to…to the loneliness of that. I want to have family again.”

Ludin averts his gaze.

“I know the feeling,” he says quietly.

Alette gasps a little. It slipped her mind that he’d just lost his father. It’s easy to remember that the king is gone, and to feel terribly inconvenienced by it, but she hadn’t fully grasped that Ludin had lost one of his own family as well.

“You’re the expert in paternal grief between us,” he tries to shake off the heaviness of the moment. “Does it get easier?”

She laughs bitterly.

“If it does, I’ve been too preoccupied to notice,” she replies.

Ludin takes this in. He notices Alette's expression darkening again. For some reason, he feels he cannot allow that.

"Let me know how I can ease your troubles, Alette," he says.

She gestures indiscriminately to the oncoming darkness. "Anything you can do about all of that?"

"Well, I have one spear," he pretends to intensely study the darkness. "I think that could do some damage."

Alette giggles. Ludin smiles at the sound. He lets the moment stretch into silence, wanting her laugh to last as long as possible. When the silence comes, Alette turns to look at him.

"What are you doing, Ludin?"

"What do you mean?" he asks.

But he knows. Alette opens her mouth to say as much, but Ludin cuts her off, deciding not to suffer the callout.

"I just want you to feel better," he says. "That's all."

"Why?"

"I don't want you to be sad."

"Why?"

"Since when are you so cynical?" he retorts.

"Since when are you so...so..." she struggles for the proper word.

"Alette..." he says softly. "I care about you, okay?"

"You what?" she blink at him.

"Well, you are our leader, after all," he blushes furiously. "It's only natural."

Alette regards him for a longer moment. Eventually, she doesn't know what to do with the moment. She bolts up from the rock and stomps away.

"Alette!" Ludin stands and trots after her. He takes her by the arm and turns her back to face him. She allows it, but she's still silent. "I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said anything."

"You don't have to be sorry," she says hollowly, still unwilling to look at him.

"You seem upset with me."

"I'm not," she shakes her head. "It's just...every piece of information I've gotten the past few months, I've had to make some critical decision on. This...I don't know what do to with this."

"I'm not asking you to decide anything," he says. "I have no ulterior motive here, Alette. I just wanted to make you feel at ease. It seems I've done the opposite. I apologize."

Alette shakes her head again. "No. Don't do that."

"Do what?"

"Apologize," she says. "You don't have to. I don't want you to."

"Okay," Ludin accepts. "I won't."

They stand there facing each other silently, not quite meeting eyes but not quite looking away. They breathe in tandem. It's unclear what they're waitin for. 

"Do you want me to go, then?" Ludin asks.

"No," she replies before he's fully gotten the sentence out.

"Oh," he says, confused. "Then...what would--"

Alette takes him by the collar and pulls him down to kiss her. He's too surprised to react for a moment. When he collects his thoughts, he's still to shocked to do much of anything.

But he kisses her back. His body is high-strung and tense, and his hands hover awkwardly in the air, but he definitely kisses her back. When she pulls away, he mentally kicks himself for not gathering himself in time to fully give in to that.

"I apologize," she says, still gripping his shirt.

"Don't do that," he echoes with a teasing smirk. "I don't want you to."

"Okay," she accepts breathlessly. "Well, then what is it that you do want?"

Ludin hesitates for only a moment. Then, he pulls her towards him and kisses her again.

This time, he's going to be more openly enthusiastic about the whole thing. 


End file.
